The videos I watched became popular in ancient times

Chapter 327: Famous White Horse is Not a Horse
As one school after another came to the fore, scholars from other schools also became nervous.

Although there are many schools of thought, not many are truly influential.

Naturally, they hoped that their school could become famous through this opportunity, and Su Chen then introduced famous scholars who were good at logical debate.

During the Pre-Qin period, great changes took place in society, which led to an unprecedented prosperity of ancient philosophical thought and the formation of a situation of a hundred schools of thought contending with each other.

The urgent practical needs of social issues at that time prompted the rise of debate thought and also led to the rapid rise of famous schools of thought.

After the Qin Dynasty unified China, it implemented a policy of cultural autocracy to maintain its rule. The Hundred Schools of Thought came to an end, and the famous schools of thought also declined.

"He was known as a debate genius during the Warring States Period, and many great masters were silenced by his refutations."

"He was called a polemical scholar by all schools of thought, and was famous in many countries, yet he was attacked by everyone."

"His doctrines have been repeatedly criticized over the past thousand years, but now he has multiple titles such as philosopher and logician."

"Gongsun Long, courtesy name Zibing, was a native of Handan, Zhao during the Warring States Period."

"He is the master of the famous school and one of its important representatives."

"The School of Names was popular in the middle and late Warring States period, advocating the rectification of names and reality, that is, rectifying the right and wrong of each other so that the names and reality are consistent."

"He was good at debate and was good at language logic and analysis, so he was also called a debater. In the Western Han Dynasty, he was called a famous scholar."

"The so-called nominalism is what we now call logic."

“It reveals the relationship between name and reality and enables people to grasp concepts and names accurately.”

“But in fact, all schools of thought believed that the theory of the School of Names was a form of sophistry.”

"To put it another way, it's the current argumentative person."

“Zhuangzi believed that the literati misinterpreted other people’s meanings and silenced them through the logic of debate, but they could not truly convince others’ hearts.”

"The academic atmosphere in Handan, the capital of Zhao State, was very strong. Gongsun Long was influenced by various schools of thought since he was a child, which made him good at thinking and being innovative."

Ying Zheng: Gongsun Long proposed the view that a white horse is not a horse, which goes against the world's cognition. Now it seems more like a means for him to make a name for himself.

During the time when Gongsun Long lived, the country was in chaos, with rituals and music in disarray.

Etiquette requires order, and order means that everyone is in his or her place, performs his or her duties, and observes etiquette.

However, when rituals and music are in decline, people in the world no longer have the concept of what is worthy of the name, and in reality, the name and the reality are seriously divorced.

For example, the literati used the same standards as the Zhou emperor when entertaining guests, wives betrayed their husbands and had affairs with others, children were unfilial and abused their parents, and so on.

This social situation caused many knowledgeable people at that time to worry.

Confucius, as the most famous thinker in the Spring and Autumn Period, first proposed the term "name" and advocated the movement to rectify names.

After that, various schools of thought began to join the wave of nominalism.

Confucianism, Mohism, Taoism, Legalism and other schools all expressed their own views on name and reality, but most of them viewed the relationship between name and reality from a political perspective.

It was not until Gongsun Long that the relationship between name and reality was truly studied as a special logical problem, forming the School of Names.

The purpose of Gongsun Long's founding doctrine was the same as that of other scholars, which was to rectify names and reality and to transform the world.

It’s just that Gongsun Long took a different path, which was to use similar hype methods to make his theories famous far and wide.

He ingeniously used the example of a white horse being not a horse, which obviously went against common sense, to illustrate his point. Sure enough, as soon as his theory came into being, masters from various schools of thought came to debate with him.

As time went by, Gongsun Long gained a place among the Hundred Schools of Thought with his view that a white horse is not a horse.

"The famous scholars represented by Gongsun Long proposed twenty-one debate propositions based on their school of thought, including six classic propositions."

"The first proposition is that eggs have hair. Famous scholars say eggs have hair."

"The reasoning is that eggs can hatch feathery chickens and ducks, so eggs are feathery."

"The second proposition is that a chicken has three legs. Famous scholars say that a chicken has three legs."

"The reason is that in addition to the two legs, plus the name chicken feet, it is concluded that the chicken has three legs."

"The third proposition is that the tortoise is longer than the snake."

"Everyone knows that a snake is longer than a turtle."

"But the famous scholars insist that turtles are longer than snakes. The reason is that turtles come in different sizes, while snakes come in different lengths. A big turtle can be longer than a short snake, so they say turtles are longer than snakes."

"The fourth proposition is that horses have eggs."

"Horses are viviparous, and birds are oviparous."

"But the famous scholars insist that horses can lay eggs. The reason is that all things are essentially the same. Horses that give birth to live young and birds that lay eggs are both things, so horses can also lay eggs, or can lay eggs."

"The fifth proposition is that a dog is not a dog."

"A dog is a dog, and a dog is a dog. They are just two names for the same thing."

"But the famous scholars say that a dog is not a canine. Er Ya once explained that a dog is called a dog when it is not fully grown.

"Gongsun Long argued that two things must have two names."

"A dog is a dog, a canine is a canine, a dog is not a canine, a canine is not a dog."

"It's not a difference in size, it's a substantial difference between the two."

"The sixth proposition, Dingzi has a tail."

"Nail is what the Chu people called frogs, and everyone knows that frogs don't have tails."

"But the famous scholars insist that frogs have tails. The reason is that frog larvae, tadpoles, have tails, which shows that frogs originally had tails."

"When I see propositions and theories like a chicken has three legs, I can't help but wonder if this is what we call arguing."

"Gongsun Long, the greatest figure of the School of Names, became famous among the nations for his seemingly controversial theories such as "a white horse is not a horse" and "a hard white stone". He is also the only one among the School of Names who left behind academic works."

Zhuangzi: Gongsun Long's thoughts are all useless and unorthodox.

The world will be confused by Gongsun Long's sophistry, which will eventually lead to chaos in the world.

Not only did the Taoists attack and criticize Gongsun Long's ideas, but even the Confucians believed that Gongsun Long's theories were harmful and had no benefits.

Even Xunzi, the representative figure of Confucianism, once said that if kings and ministers like Gongsun Long's ideas, it will lead to chaos in the law, and if the people like it, things will be chaotic.

The reason why Confucianism and Taoism believe that Gongsun Long's ideas are useless.

This is because, although the purpose of Gongsun Long's theory was to rectify names and reality and transform the world.

However, Gongsun Long's propositions rarely contain political views and opinions, but more of logical reasoning and proof methods.

This makes Gongsun Long's thoughts seem somewhat difficult to understand, so it is naturally difficult to implement and apply them.

If ordinary people cannot understand the connotation of Gongsun Long's thoughts, it is easy for them to misunderstand his logical thinking as sophistry, which is naturally useless.

At the same time, Gongsun Longzi's logical thinking is completely opposite to what the rulers need to do to fool the people.

If people widely accept Gongsun Long's ideas, and everyone has his or her own independent consciousness, ideas and opinions, then the rulers' policies to fool the people will be difficult to implement and promote.

Only when the people in the world are ignorant can it be easy for the rulers to enforce orders and bring peace to the world.

"One day, Gongsun Long wanted to enter the city with a white horse, but the guard told him that the city had a rule that horses were not allowed to enter the city."

"Gongsun Long then argued with him using the proposition that a white horse is not a horse."

"Gongsun Long said that white refers to the color of the horse, and horse refers to the shape of the horse."

"White is used to refer to the color of a horse, not its shape."

“So the combination of the two concepts of white and horse does not mean the abstract concept of horse.”

"Gongsun Long said that if you go to the stable to get a horse, both the black horse and the yellow horse are your options."

"If you only take white horses, then yellow horses and black horses are not your choices."

“When the horses were taken, both the yellow horse and the black horse came, and they could be considered the same.”

"Let's just say there is a horse, but not a white horse. This shows that the white horse is not a horse."

"In Gongsun Long's view, the concept of a white horse is very concrete, while the concept of a horse is very abstract."

"However, common sense is very contradictory. A white horse is a horse."

"This is equivalent to saying that the concrete white horse is an abstract horse."

"If we interpret his philosophical proposition, it should be read as: a concrete horse is not an abstract horse, and a concrete thing is not an abstract thing."

"From this we can see that the philosophical proposition that a white horse is not a horse marks the improvement of human cognitive ability, and that we have noticed the relationship between the concrete and the abstract, the individual and the general, and the individual and the common."

"Gongsun Long first raised this question, adding a new dimension to philosophy."

"The philosophical views he put forward far exceeded the cognitive level of people in his time, which is why his views were not understood by the various schools of thought."

Han Feizi: Gongsun Long was generally considered by all the philosophers to be a sophist and seemed unable to win in a debate.

Every sentence of Gongsun Long's words is correct when read separately, and it is irrefutable.

However, the conclusions drawn from these correct words go against the general perception of the world.

Since he was unable to admit it but also unable to refute it, people gave Gongsun Long the title of sophist.

Gongsun Long's ability to refute was so strong that even Confucius' descendants could not refute him.

Once, Confucius' sixth-generation grandson Kong Chuan passed by the State of Zhao and made a special trip to Lord Pingyuan to debate with Gongsun Long.

Kong Chuan said that Gongsun Long was a man of high moral character and that he had long wanted to be his disciple, but he could not agree with the doctrine that a white horse was not a horse. As long as Gongsun Long gave up this doctrine, he would ask to be his disciple.

Gongsun Long refuted that he became famous only because of his theory that a white horse is not a horse.

There is nothing to teach him to give it up now.

Then Gongsun Long criticized Kong Chuan's attitude towards learning. Those who want to become someone else's disciple are always inferior to others in intelligence and academics.

Now asking him to give up his own teachings means teaching him first and then worshipping him as a teacher. This is wrong.

Gongsun Long then quoted from classics and said that the statement that a white horse is not a horse was also agreed by Confucius.

Once upon a time, the King of Chu drew his bow and loaded it with arrows while hunting in the fields of Yunmeng, but he lost the bow.

The followers requested to go find him, but the King of Chu said no need.

The Chu people lost their bow, and the Chu people picked it up, so why bother looking for it?

After hearing this, Confucius said that the King of Chu's benevolence and righteousness had not yet reached the highest level.

It should be said that someone lost the bow and someone else picked it up, why mention the State of Chu?

Gongsun Long believed that according to this statement, Confucius was distinguishing the people of Chu from others.

People affirm Confucius' statement that he distinguished the Chu people from other people, but deny his statement that he distinguished white horses from other horses. This is wrong.

Finally, Gongsun Long concluded that Kong Chuan followed Confucianism but opposed the views that Confucius agreed with.

I wanted to learn from him, but he asked me to give up what I was going to teach.

In this way, even if there were a hundred people like him, they would not be able to be Kong Chuan's teacher.

After listening to the argument, Kong Chuan was speechless.

"Gongsun Long cited an example of a hard white stone in his book Gongsun Longzi: Hard and White Theory to illustrate the theory of hard and white stone."

"He believed that the two properties of whiteness and hardness could not exist in stone at the same time, and there was no necessary connection between the two."

"The eye can only see the whiteness of the stone, but cannot see the hardness of the stone."

"At this moment, it is equivalent to the hardness of the stone being hidden."

"That is to say, there are only white stones at this time, rather than white and hard stones."

“You can feel the hardness of the stone by touching it, but you can’t feel the whiteness of the stone.”

"At this point, it's like the color attribute of the stone is hidden."

"That is to say, there is only hard stone at this time, not white and hard stone."

"White and hard are two incompatible properties. When one appears, the other leaves."

"That is to say, a stone is not hard because it is white, and vice versa, it is not white because it is hard."

"Similarly, there is no necessary correlation between a person's height and their talent."

"Finally, Gongsun Long concluded that hardness and whiteness existed independently of the stone."

"It means that the properties of an object exist independently of the object, and there is no necessary connection between them. This is the theory of Li Jian Bai."

Liu Che: The famous scholars went into decline after the Warring States Period, and completely disappeared after Confucianism became the only official ideology.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, topics such as hard and white were popular.

The so-called hard and white refers to the hard qualities and white color.

From common sense, something like stone can certainly be a white stone with hard properties.

But in the eyes of famous artists, hard and white cannot be put together.

Gongsun Long emphasized that firmness is a tactile property of an object, which relies on the sensitivity of human tactile organs.

White is the visual attribute of an object and depends on the human visual organ.

From a tactile point of view, people can only feel the hardness of the stone but cannot see the white color.

From a visual perspective, people can only see white and cannot feel the hard quality.

Therefore, no matter from which perspective, hard and white cannot coexist in the same thing.

Obviously, from a common sense perspective, one can certainly perceive a stone as both hard and white at the same time.

Gongsun Long, however, insisted on separating them, and what is involved here is the issue of logical inference.

Gongsun Long did not insist that a stone could not be both hard and white from a common sense perspective, but explained it from a logical perspective.

Gongsun Long has surpassed the ordinary people's emotional thinking and chose to detach himself from specific things to observe the logic behind them.

Therefore, in Gongsun Long's view, hard and white are already two separate concepts that exist independently and do not depend on something to exist.

Although a stone can certainly be both hard and white, what Gongsun Long wants to illustrate is that other things can also have both qualities.

Therefore, the point is not whether the stone has the characteristics of hardness and whiteness.

In other words, the question of whether a stone can be both hard and white is meaningless, because this question can be answered by starting from real life phenomena.

What Gongsun Long wanted to confirm was that hardness or whiteness themselves exist as different concepts.

And these concepts govern not a specific thing but the entire world of experience.

Even further, people may never have seen the real white, and all they have seen is the concept of white.

The reason is simple: concepts exist to distinguish different things.

White is white because it is not black.

When you want to confirm whether it is white, you must first confirm black, and to confirm black you need to confirm other colors.

In other words, people are always on the road of confirming whiteness, but can never really touch it.

Perhaps it was because Gongsun Long showed the world a knowledge that was completely different from experience, and people at that time had not yet learned to think about problems completely from a conceptual level.

Therefore, after the Warring States Period, the famous schools of thought quickly declined.

"From these examples, it can be seen that the School of Names is indeed suspected of being a sophistry that confuses things."

"But more than 2,000 years later, people discovered that the famous scholars represented by Gongsun Long adhered to the materialist position of the primacy of matter, which belongs to the category of logical philosophy."

"Moreover, Gongsun Long's proposition that a white horse is not a horse is similar to the ontological theory of the ancient Greek thinker Aristotle, which is a unique contribution to the ontology of ancient Chinese philosophy."

"In addition, Gongsun Long's theory of hard and white stone is also strikingly similar to Plato's theory of universals in Greece at the same time."

"Gongsun Long constructed a fairly rich philosophical theory about language itself. His achievements were no less than Aristotle's. He was the true founder of the theoretical edifice of Chinese logic."

"But unfortunately, because Gongsun Long's teachings were not the art of emperorship, they did not contribute to the rule of the feudal dynasty."

"In addition, the philosophical theory was too profound, and was considered by the various schools of thought at the time to be a sophistry that confused reality with names, and was criticized."

"So after Qin Shihuang unified the six kingdoms, the School of Names began to be marginalized."

"After Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty established Confucianism as the only official school of thought, the teachings of the famous scholars disappeared."

"Gongsun Long's theory now seems to have great limitations."

"He metaphysically severed the relationship between the general and the particular, and exaggerated the difference between the general and the particular, which resulted in metaphysical sophistry."

"But this does not affect Gongsun Long's great contribution and influence on Chinese logic."

“He correctly revealed almost all the rich content and most basic laws of thinking in the theory of formal logic concepts.”

“And began to study the question of name and reality as a real logical problem, making it an independent field of knowledge, rather than a vassal of ethics and politics.”

"In this sense, Gongsun Long is the founder of Chinese logic."

Liang Qichao: The logic theory founded by Gongsun Long can be said to be his greatest contribution to the history of ancient Chinese thought.

Among the various schools of thought, the School of Names was the product of the great social changes during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period.

Their debates, with their anti-traditional spirit, served the new regime.

But because they understand things from different perspectives, their views are different.

Gongsun Long unilaterally exaggerated one aspect of cognition and emphasized the difference between things.

They have insightful ideas in this area, but these insights are limited by metaphysical thinking methods.

Their mistakes are inevitable in the history of human cognitive development, and the logical thinking of the later Mohists is a critical summary of them.

Gongsun Long is also the most controversial figure in the history of ancient Chinese thought, but his unique philosophical thoughts and way of thinking have made great contributions to the history of Chinese philosophical thought.

When Gongsun Long observed things, he absolutized the individual and the general by using the concept of "separation".

Only seeing separation but not unity does not conform to the dialectical view that "the individual exists in the general."

But he was able to open up the field of logic and establish a theoretical system of logic, which contributed to the development of a hundred schools of thought.

In Chinese history, most schools of thought focused on the study of political ethics, and most of them did not understand logic.

They even do not recognize this discipline and often criticize Gongsun Long's logical thinking based on political and ethical concepts.

It was not until modern times that people openly acknowledged the logical problems of Gongsun Long's dialectical object and paid attention to them.

(End of this chapter)